When Nicolette John applied to college last fall, she aimed high.

“My dream was to at least hit one of the Ivy Leagues. Like, I just wanted to be among, I just wanted to be among, like, the brilliant people and to have those opportunities," she says.

Nicolette, who grew up in East Flatbush, Brooklyn and attends Stuyvesant High School, reached her goal -- eight times over.   

She received admission offers not to just one but all eight Ivy schools.

"As I was opening each of the letters, like, I became more and more, like amazed and shocked. Like all my hard work and studying for hours on end and just like going at it constantly, it finally paid off," she says.

It was the end result of a grueling process. But Nicolette is no stranger to academic pressure.

To attend Stuyvesant, she had to score well on the Specialized High School Admissions Test, the sole basis for getting in.  

"I feel like getting into Stuyvesant, that was more geared around test prep," she says. "For the college admissions process, it was more holistic."

The admissions process for the city's selective public high schools is facing new criticism, after only seven black students scored high enough to be admitted to Stuyvesant this year.

Nicolette says she took free, city-sponsored prep classes to prepare for the test, something she says more students and parents should know about.

She says her experience as a black student at Stuyvesant has been positive, but scrutiny of the school has made her want to do more to improve its diversity.

"It makes you want to become more active in seeing what we can do to make a change in the statistics," she says.

At Stuyvesant, Nicolette founded the SAT Club, tutoring students who cannot afford private prep classes for that high-stakes test.

"I know the struggle of not having the funds to prepare for this test myself so having to self-study and go through all that, I know the struggle that it is. So being able to help students wherever they're coming from, it was an amazing thing for me,"

Nicolette hasn't decided yet where she'll go to college, but she does know she wants to study biology or chemistry, and attend medical school to become a pediatrician.